


Crush

by ABSedarian



Series: Thirty Worlds (AU Challenge) [5]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: AU Challenge, Alternate Universe - High School, Challenge on Infinite Earths, F/F, High School AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-09
Updated: 2015-05-09
Packaged: 2018-03-29 18:43:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,404
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3906709
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ABSedarian/pseuds/ABSedarian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Challenge on Infinite Earths / AU Challenge</p><p>Day 5: High School</p><p>Emma Swan is having a most miserable day. Until she isn't.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Crush

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: Not my characters.

Emma Swan pushed her thick-rimmed glasses a little higher up her nose as she focused on the droning of her insufferably boring teacher. If she didn’t need this credit, she’d never show up for this wreck of a class. It also didn’t help that the teacher was her mother … well, adoptive mother, a fact that she had always kept quiet. She loved her mother dearly, she did, but her Science class consisted of birds, birds, and birds again. And Emma _hated_ birds, had hated the damn things ever since her mom’s pet parrot had bitten her when she was five. 

But there was also a very good reason to actually show up in her mother’s class every Friday after Study Hall: it was the only class she shared with Regina Mills. 

_Queen Regina_ , as she was known around the school. 

_Just Regina_ in Emma’s head. 

Regina Mills was the girl who had it all — friends, success, money. Yet, from all her years of observing the object of her fascination, Emma had decided that there was a perpetual air of sadness about her that she normally managed to hide very well, and Emma sure as hell wasn’t going to ask about it. She could just imagine what would happen if somebody approached Regina Mills and asked her if everything was okay. 

The thing was, Emma had never actually _talked_ to Regina. Storybrooke High was a huge school, and this year was the first year they’d ever even had a class together, so it had always been easy to watch from a distance and develop this enormous crush on a girl she could never have. 

Only it wasn’t a crush. 

Emma sighed. No, having a simple crush on Regina Mills would be too easy. She had to go and fall in love with her, and she wasn’t even sure it had been over time — like normal people fell in love — and not just _bam_ that one moment in sophomore year when they had crashed into each other in the hallway. Which, sadly, had been the only time she had ever managed to get _that_ close to Regina. 

Close enough to see the tiny gold flecks in the dark eyes, and take a good look at that curious, beautiful scar on her upper lip that she wanted to spend hours running her tongue over, again and again and again. 

The bell rang and shocked Emma out of her trance. She had missed the entire class, had no idea what her mother had talked about, which of course would make for an interesting dinner conversation that night. Emma lived for the obstacle courses that were conversations with her mother about school. 

Her hand stilled on her notepad and she wondered if a part of her brain had followed the class after all and had taken notes. One could hope, but no. Emma looked down and dropped her pencil in her hurried attempt to hide her notepad from view, but it was too late. A hand was already grabbing for it and pulling it from her desk. 

“Well, well, look what Swan has been doing all class,” Killian Jones shouted, drawing everyone’s attention. 

Including Regina’s. 

Everyone gathered around her desk to try and get a better look at the notepad that Killian held high above his head. There were lots of mean-spirited little laughs, and Emma let her head fall onto the desk. If she wasn’t in the room, she could avoid being mortally embarrassed. _Right?_

“Looks like our little nerd has a thing for Regina,” Belle pointed out loudly enough for it to reach everyone’s ears, but her voice didn’t sound as cruel as Emma had expected it to. The tittering and chattering grew to new heights at that juicy tidbit. 

“Like most of the school does,” Ruby yelled. She wasn’t part of Regina’s clique, was more of a free spirit, so Emma was mildly disappointed that she had joined in the teasing. 

“Yeah, but unlike the rest of the school, the nerd doesn’t stand a chance,” Robin bellowed from the front of the class. 

Emma growled low in her throat. She hated the quarterback with the burning passion of a thousand suns. He was always sniffing around Regina, even though the other girl hadn’t shown any interest in him as far as Emma could tell. Maybe she had just been hiding it and they were an item after all? Emma’s world sank and she blocked out all sounds, slipping deeper into a world of her own making, a world where she could just walk up to Regina Mills and tell her how beautiful she thought she was, and how much she would like to make sure that she was happy and smiling for the rest of her life. 

Her brain refused to stay in the dream world, however, and she returned to the class room only moments later, although it was much quieter than it had been before. She could hear shuffling feet, and some grumbling, and then the door closed. With her luck, one of the teachers had been privy to her humiliation, which would double the fun at dinner tonight. 

She raised her head, determined to at least face the music head on. 

And came face to face with Regina Mills. 

Regina who was holding her notepad in one hand, tracing the lines of the drawing Emma had done of her with two fingers of her other hand. Regina who was smiling for some unfathomable reason. 

“I’m sorry,” Emma mumbled, although she wasn’t sure why. 

Regina looked up from the drawing and met Emma’s eyes. “Why? This is actually quite good,” she said, and Emma couldn’t detect any sarcasm in the deep, raspy voice that sounded much too old for a teenager. 

Emma shrugged. “I don’t know … for drawing you without your permission?” She hated that she turned into a squeaky mess when she was nervous. “For …” 

Regina raised an eyebrow, and Emma could swear that this perfectly plucked eyebrow could hold whole conversations just by moving this way or that. “For?” Regina asked. 

Emma blushed but couldn’t come up with the words to say. So much for her dream world where she could talk to Regina and tell her. 

“Emma,” Regina said softly. 

“You know my name?” 

Regina chuckled. “Of course I do,” she replied, and there was something in her voice that had Emma’s ears perking up. “Was Belle right?” 

Emma swallowed. “About what?” 

Okay, Regina’s eye rolls could join the eyebrows’ conversation. “About you liking me?” 

Emma was glad that she hadn’t repeated Belle’s stupider word choice. H _ere’s your chance, Swan. Do it. Do. It._ But her throat constricted around the words, refusing to let them out. She swallowed three frogs, and then a fourth, but apparently she had become host to a whole army. She met Regina’s eyes, trying to speak with her own eyes since her vocal chords refused to do their job. 

“A little overwhelmed?” Regina teased with a small smirk, and Emma tensed up instantly. That was what she had been waiting for, the teasing, the taunting, being told just how unworthy she was. Regina seemed to notice, though, since she dropped her smirk in a second and looked serious again. “I never thought I’d have this whole conversation by myself, you know?” she said after a moment’s pause, sounding a little frustrated. 

That kicked Emma into working mode again. “What conversation?” she blurted. “Wait, you thought about having a conversation with me?” 

Regina dropped the notepad on Emma's desk. “I have,” she admitted quietly. “Look, would it help you to know that I like you too?” 

Emma’s eyes went wider than her mom’s good dinner plates. “Truth?” was all she could get out. 

Regina nodded. “You’re a runner, right?” 

Well, that was a complete non sequitur, but Emma went with it. This situation couldn’t get any stranger anyway. “I am. Why?” 

“Because I’m going to do something now, and I wanted to make sure you're not going to have a heart attack.” 

“No, my ticker’s fine,” Emma replied automatically. “What are you going to do?” 

Instead of an answer, Regina simply gave her a patient smile that told Emma two things: one, Regina actually seemed to like her for some reason, and two, she thought Emma was a bit of an idiot. 

“Kiss you, you idiot,” Regina finally whispered, confirming both of Emma's deductions. 

**The End**

**Author's Note:**

> Next stop: Mythical Creatures


End file.
